Demolitions Not Only Continue to Wreck Livelihoods, Now Used as 'Punitive Measure’: Report

-TheWire.in

Governments demolished 36,486 houses in 2021 – meaning at least 100 homes were destroyed every day. In other words, at least 567 were evicted every day or 24 people lost their homes every hour.

New Delhi: The latest report of the Housing and Land Rights Network (HLRN) on forced evictions in India has pointed to the new disturbing trend of “demolitions as a punitive measure” by various state governments and noted that these “arbitrary acts” of demolishing of homes and structures of minority communities have compounded the vulnerabilities of women, children, older persons, and persons with disabilities.

The report has also highlighted the vulnerabilities of the marginalised sections to forced evictions. It has stated that while “a total of 158 incidents of forced eviction/home demolition have been documented” in 2021, about 15 million people across rural and urban areas continue to face the threat of eviction from their habitats.

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